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If you’re driving 80-90 miles an hour—and you can in some countries, legally—you don’t want to be flipping around an iPad looking to move your door mirrors or your seat controls. You need to be able to feel your way through the car without looking at it for more than a millisecond.
Ian Callum got this right.
Additionally, think what these screens, if they still work, would look like in 10 years. IPhone 1 is about 11 years old, most of 11 year old cars are still on the road. Now imagine that IPhone 1 is glued to your car's dash and you have no choice but to work with it to control heat, radio, seat position and so on.
I wonder how hard it would be to make a tactile mask for the screen that you flip over it like the sheets they sell as screen protector.
Then the whole thing would be a fysical set of switches again. You only need a menu switch to page trough the menu.
Thank God someone of prominence finally mentions this.
I would hate to be driving at highway speeds and have to be swapping screens and whatnot to open or close the sunroof, change AC settings, etc. To be honest, I don't know how some of these companies have gotten away with eliminating all buttons with a touchscreen. I guess to hell with safety?
The XE that I have ordered for my missus comes with a 10", I think Ian would have a hard time convincing her to give up 10 inches for 7.
as everyone is far more classy than I am, I will remain somewhat dignified on the periphery of a potential joke. I'm "old" from the perspective of being a DJ. Not a hipster, I just have a huge record collection, hate learning curves, and never learned the fancy modern digital djing stuff. Also, with a bag of vinyl, you can't really take requests, which is nice. But in spinning wax, one of my dj friends found a joke record bag that says "Hey Laptop DJ, your girlfriend prefers 12"". It's absurdly crass and sophomoric, and he doesn't actually take it out to gigs.... but it's just funny how our culture ribs and riffs on the most atavistic of our evolved needs. It's crazy that we're all running around with important jobs, complex lives, and just pretending our culture is so advanced, when 95% of everything is driven by war and lust. The other 5% might be 2% love and 3% snacks and cookies. Also, we go to 200% for wine.
I wonder how hard it would be to make a tactile mask for the screen that you flip over it like the sheets they sell as screen protector.
Then the whole thing would be a fysical set of switches again. You only need a menu switch to page trough the menu.
But then your on the level of BMW i-drive system.
I am severely light headed from a work out, so I am not sure I am envisioning this right. But I would love to see someone tactile up the new screen. It's really slick, well designed, software is light years ahead, but no physical keys is distracting enough (and I can "feel" it, really can tell) that I have started to make sure everything is set prior to driving... music, nav, etc. As it should be. But would love to see innovative DIY. If Burning Man taught me anything, it was self sufficiency is your job, and no one else is going to do it for you. =)
Thank God someone of prominence finally mentions this.
I would hate to be driving at highway speeds and have to be swapping screens and whatnot to open or close the sunroof, change AC settings, etc. To be honest, I don't know how some of these companies have gotten away with eliminating all buttons with a touchscreen. I guess to hell with safety?
I remember seeing a non engineer doing this on twitter, saying "it's a revolution, it's so amazing". I remember thinking NHTSA would never greenlight a tablet to control stuff like this. The twitter one had a guy, at speed, sloppily trying to find the part of the screen to drag around the air vents. It's just so stupid.
I just spent too long looking for the fanboy "this is so genius let me mash my hands all over a giant tablet" video, but it's lost to time and my confusion of whether it was reddit, twitter, etc. I am not omitting the Jag 10" screen, but the *real* tablets are massively distracting. I'm glad, as you said, someone like Ian stepped up.
At least add voltmeter, boost, oil pressure/temp, and water temp gauges. I’d also take ammeter, IAT, tranny temp and diff temp gauges. All analog so that I can interpret them quickly. I want to see trends. Only the speedometer should be digital. OK...so I’m living in the wrong century, but I love the computerized engine management.
It's all about cost. A screen and software is far cheaper to produce these days than well built buttons and switches. Such a shame, but it's one of the main reasons I cannot stand the interiors of Tesla's and have no desire to ever own one for that reason alone. Plenty of other reasons as well, but this one in particular drives me nuts.
At least add voltmeter, boost, oil pressure/temp, and water temp gauges. I’d also take ammeter, IAT, tranny temp and diff temp gauges. All analog so that I can interpret them quickly. I want to see trends. Only the speedometer should be digital. OK...so I’m living in the wrong century, but I love the computerized engine management.
I am discussing the option of a OBD2 BT plug. I know the Jag gets upset if you shove whatever OBD2 plug in it, so I let the importer decide which make/model/type is 'jaguar approved' .
Then I link it with my mobile which has an app "Torque Pro" ,
in which you can choose dials for all data available in the socket...
I remember seeing a non engineer doing this on twitter, saying "it's a revolution, it's so amazing". I remember thinking NHTSA would never greenlight a tablet to control stuff like this. The twitter one had a guy, at speed, sloppily trying to find the part of the screen to drag around the air vents. It's just so stupid.
Tesla is what happens when cars are designed by app developers. Consequently, it isn't a car, it a cellphone with a large battery and wheels attached.
People park cars outside in the cold, wear gloves, drive in construction zones in the rain... There has to be a physical button and a knob to control heat/cold so you can control it by memory. These controls should be easy to reach and manipulate without looking away from the road.
That video showcases idiotic design and it is accident waiting to happen. I kept waiting for him to rearend that dump truck. How is that not distracted driving?
I couldn’t agree more as I traded my daily driver a 2014 Ram sport having the most intuitive infotainment system I’ve experienced that included redundant buttons. Changing radio stations or volume was done without moving my hands or even fingers as the switches were on the back side of the wheel. My 2018 MB GLE 400 has most things done through the screen. In order to change stations I must move my hand down to the pad on the console and insure the screen is on “radio” as apposed to seat seatings and than swipe my fingers which is prone to skipping past my desired station etc.. of course I have to take my eyes off the road to do this.
After 6 months it still does not feel intuitive or natural
Technology for the sake of technology.
Nice. Same for LR offloading... Tactile is important. The new 10" is far and away more distracting than the one with physical buttons.
Which is one of the reasons why I preferred the 2018 MY before they installed the 10" screens in the 2019's. 2018's have basically all the same software as 2019 but with a more compact 8" touch screen...
I couldn’t agree more as I traded my daily driver a 2014 Ram sport having the most intuitive infotainment system I’ve experienced that included redundant buttons. Changing radio stations or volume was done without moving my hands or even fingers as the switches were on the back side of the wheel. My 2018 MB GLE 400 has most things done through the screen. In order to change stations I must move my hand down to the pad on the console and insure the screen is on “radio” as apposed to seat seatings and than swipe my fingers which is prone to skipping past my desired station etc.. of course I have to take my eyes off the road to do this.
After 6 months it still does not feel intuitive or natural
Technology for the sake of technology.
Not sure if you have the coupe version of the GLE but I like the looks of the coupe version of these. Porsche also has a cayenne coupe now. I thought the GLE coupe would make for a nice 2nd car for winter but the ipad on the dash is a deal breaker on any car for me. The Porsche screen is integrated though. Audi has "exposed" ipads in there 7 series too. Negatively impacts the looks imo. How do you like the GLE otherwise?
Ian on in car tablets
